CONTENTS Young Children Working in Tenement Houses Young Children in Domestic Work THE CHILD, The State, anD THE NATION Consequences of Recognition of the Child's Right Inter-State Aspect of the Right to Childhood The Unsought Leisure of Prosperous Women Enforced Idleness is not Leisure JUDICIAL INTERPRETATIONS OF THE RIGHT TO LEISURE . 127 The Right to Leisure Accorded to Public Servants 128 Need of Women in Educational Work Protection of Children in Colorado The Rights of Purchasers, and the Courts The New York Decision of 1884 (In re Jacobs) The Development and Attempted Regulation of CHAPTER I THE RIGHT TO CHILDHOOD It is no part of the aim of this chapter to prove that the right to childhood exists. That right follows from the existence of the Republic and must be guarded in order to guard its life which must perish if it should ever cease to be replenished by generations of patriots, who can be secured on no other terms than the full recognition of the need of long-cherished, carefully nurtured childhood for all the future citizens. The purpose of this chapter is simply to indicate certain instances in which, the right to childhood having been recognized, an ethical gain has been achieved, and farther gains may be accomplished. The noblest duty of the Republic is that of selfpreservation by so cherishing all its children that they, in turn, may become enlightened self-governing citizens. The children of to-day are potentially the Republic of 1930. As they are cherished and trained, so will it live or languish a generation hence. The care and nurture of childhood is thus a vital concern of the nation. For if children perish in infancy they are obviously lost to the Republic as citizens. If, surviving infancy, children are permitted to deteriorate into criminals, they are bad |